The Sane Energy Project is holding a forum:

What can New Yorkers expect if high-volume hydrofracking is permitted here? Analysis of 2700 Pennsylvania gas wells shows that the highest yields are where shale is deepest and thickest. But the Marcellus shale gets thinner and shallower rapidly as it crosses the border into New York, leading to predictions of significantly less production, but with considerable potential damage from frack waste and drill cutting disposal, road damage, compressor stations, and pipelines. Moderated by Prof. Anthony Ingraffea. Presentations by geologist Brian Brock, systems analyst Jerry Acton, oil and gas experts Chip Northrup and Lou Allstadt.

New York Society for Ethical Culture, 2 West 64th Street, 6:30–9 pm, Doors open 6:00 pm, Suggested Donation $5-10. Share the facebook event.

Join us as we kick off the Cleantech Corridor 2.0 Networking Series! Get an early look at our new team, partners and program to foster a community of organizations and individuals looking to help drive policy in new clean technologies and green building. Spend time connecting and learning about Cleantech Corridor’s new energy marketing campaign that includes a member community, monthly networking events, cleantech magazine/buyer’s guide and clean tech conference/expo and jobs fair in October 2013. Most importantly, come learn about our “Parity for Cleantech” mantra – the success of alternative energy without punishing the tax payer.

On Monday April 4, 2011 Wall Street meets GreenStreet: An Evening of Sustainable Discussion

In the photo from the left: Ran Kohn from Cleantech Corridor, Sarah Biser from McCarter & English, Sadie McKeown from CPC, BIn the photo from the left: Ran Kohn from Cleantech Corridor, Sarah Biser from McCarter & English, Sadie McKeown from CPC, Bomee Jung from Enterprise, SamMarks from DB, Jeff Perlman from Bright Power, Sean Patrick Neill from Cycle-7 and Bruce Schlein from Citi.

What has to happen to transform a static vertical city like New York into a greener and more energy efficient one? Retrofit and modernize the buildings, for one.

Yet that answer didn’t begin to plumb the depths on the vibrant discussion of expert panelists, sponsored by Cleantech Corridor on Monday night April 4.

Held at the law office of McCarter & English, LLP on Park Avenue, the five-member panel —divided equally down affordable housing, city policy, and financing lines—took the subject of funding the next phase in the green revolution to task. The challenges, they stated, are as immense as their passion and expertise are on the issues. Thus, through the gauze of the to-be-defined framework of funding those initiatives, a few common denominators emerged.

• Structured financing that can service the debt in retrofitting old buildings
• A new metrics to illuminate how to monetize green building upgrades
• Public money and policy to spur the momentum for economies of scale
• The need to drive innovation with private lending

The global consensus from the panelists was the need to gain traction by finding ways to aggregate funding over a disparate array of buildings, from commercial to residential and affordable housing. In the packed conference room with 130 industry professionals, however, only three raised their hands as private lenders. That small turnout didn’t detract, as much as it was a measure, a snapshot of where the industry is today. Much work on the structures of financing has to be done.

Sadie McKeown, Senior Vice President and Director of Lending at CPC Hudson Valley and Connecticut regions, and Bomee Jung, Manager of energy and environmental performance initiatives at Enterprise, led the way on discussions and the realities of affordable housing market, including identifying barriers of change all the way down to the building manager. They not only emphasized that savings in real costs had to exceed the standard 10% for those managers to consider retrofits for their buildings, but on the financing side the retrofits, but it had to “capture good cash flow,” as Ms. McKeown stated.

On the big bank financing of sustainable and renewable energy projects, Sam Marks, Vice President at Deutsche Bank’s Community Development Finance Group, and Bruce Schlein, Vice President of Corporate Sustainability at Citi bank, covered the business areas of lending on large scale green projects and how the banking industry will follow government and the smaller private lenders into the sector once the metrics are fleshed out and the green retrofits can be monetized successfully.

The good news, besides the healthy discussion by the four panelists, was the fifth one in Sean Patrick Neill, founder and principal of a consultancy Cycle7, who pointed out that he is working on developing the new metrics to fund sustainable projects in existing buildings. “The availability of the structure to lend, not financing itself,” he said, referring to what needs to be done next. Jeff Perlman President and Founder of Bright Power moderated the round table discussion with Sarah Biser partner at McCarter & English, LLP.

If the metrics are designed and they support an environment of growth opportunities, the money will follow and more cleaner, green and energy efficient buildings will become part of an old city remaking itself to ensure a sustainable future.

James O. Grundvig

Cleantech Corridor’s Solar Energy Summit–Monday Dec 5, 2011

At the December 5 “Solar Energy in New York” conference, Ran Kohn, Executive Director of the Cleantech Corridor, Inc., opened the panel discussion with a keynote speech before a packed house the New York Institute of Technology Auditorium on Broadway. Kohn said that solar energy is too important to let politics get in the way of its acceptance as happened to the climate change debate: “For the future success of solar energy, it’s vital that all of us, regardless of our political colors, make sure that solar is apolitical.”

The event focused on the New York Solar Industry Development and Jobs Act which is finally garnering some attention in Albany. Still, many of the guest panelists believe it will not pass in its current form. While New York State tries to push the bill through, in some form, New Jersey, the audience of professionals, students, and clean tech and sustainable specialists learned that it was the number two solar markets behind California. Pretty impressive, when one considers the Garden State is located next door to New York, but not all the way to the south where the sun shines more often, longer, and with more intensity.

Panel Moderator Chris McDermott of Hartz Capital, a real estate developer, along with Sarah Biser of McCarter & English LLP, the program sponsor, guided the audience through the complexity of the new SRECs markets, which is done on a state-to-state basis. To date, there are less than a dozen SREC state markets. Aware that the new form of sponsoring and financing solar energy installations is new to many, at times they stopped the collaborative presentation to let the panel speaker explain the concept of SRECs, what’s driving them what are the challenges in the new market, and how the states and their people can benefit to rapidly expand the growth of solar energy.

The summit panel was comprised of David Buckner, President, Solar Energy Systems, LLC; Alan Epstein, President and COO, KDC Solar LLC; Michael Flett, President and CEO, Flett Exchange; Richard Klein, President and Founder, Quixotic Systems, Inc.; William Nelson, US REC market analyst, Bloomberg New Energy Finance.

James O. Grundvig

Our Tuesday May 4, 2010 Green Building Retrofits event drew as usual our fullly subscribed crowd that filled the Haworth Showroom with over 100 plus guests, who heard from New York’s leading real estate experts as well as the Chief Sustainability Officer NYC Department of Buildings.